WikiRace Activity
WikiRace Overview A WikiRace is race where participants are given a starting topic to search for on Wikipedia. After all participants have navigated to the topic, they are given a "Target Topic" that they are trying to reach through Wikipedia. Participants can only use links on any given Wikipedia entry page to navigate toward this topic. For our activity today, you will be divided into groups of two to three in order to work together in the race and for the reflection. WikiRace Activity Instructions # Go to http://www.wikipedia.org using Google Chrome (or your preferred web browser) # Search for the starting topic using the search box in the center of the page #* Note: If you would prefer, you can also use the Wikipedia app available for iOS and Android on your mobile device # Using only links on the starting topic page and the "Back" functionality of your web browser, try to navigate toward the Target Topic provided by your instructor #* Keep in mind the different considerations and choices you are making to try to get from one topic to the next, and how that relates to the functionality of the Wikipedia platform and general usability # Once you have reached the Target Topic, notify your instructor # After the WikiRaces have concluded, navigate to the WikiRace Reflection Instructions page for more details on how to proceed WikiRace Activity Framework (for Instructors) The WikiRace Activity was created to teach in conjunction with "Technological Literacy: A Framework for Teaching Technical Communication Software Tools" by Marjorie Rush Hovde and Corinne C. Renguette. The activity is designed to introduce a group of peers to the levels of technological literacy Hovde and Renguette discuss, and put the functional and conceptual skills into practice while also examining usability and accessibility of wikispace tools. This assignment could also be adapted for use in the English 219 Technical and Professional Writing course, with specific adjustments to remove this pedagogical framework, and to push the reflection questions from the activity toward more applicable reflection questions suited for the discussion learning and transfer related to the functional, conceptual, evaluative, and critical levels of technological literacy. Students could be asked to experiment with the functionality of wikispaces through use (navigating, creating, editing), consider the skills that they are learning through use of wikispaces as a tool, evaluate the application for this and other similar tools in workplace settings, and ask them to expand on ethical and social aspects related to use of wikispaces as it pertains to accessibility, usability, and a range of other ethical and social considerations. If adapting this assignment for use in a Technical and Professional Writing classroom, I would recommend providing time for students to experiment with navigating and editing the space (through use of tutorials/instructions), create their own, brief page related to a specified topic, and then add in reflection related to their considerations across the activity (rather than having reflection all on one page). The idea behind this is that students cultivate functional skills that scaffold into technological literacy through the conceptual, evaluative, and critical levels, to show that this is one of many tools that they have the ability to use, but can also use as a stepping stone when evaluating what software and technologies are most applicable to future situations in the workplace. WikiRace Activity Comments Please feel free to leave any comments regarding the WikiRace Activity and Reflection in the section below.